


Folded and Unfolded and Unfolding

by unknowableroom_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-11-07
Updated: 2007-11-07
Packaged: 2019-01-19 22:58:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,774
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12420018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknowableroom_archivist/pseuds/unknowableroom_archivist
Summary: Or, several instances in which Victoire Weasley feels lighter and heavier at the same time.





	Folded and Unfolded and Unfolding

**Author's Note:**

> Note from ChristyCorr, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Unknowable Room](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Unknowable_Room), a Harry Potter archive active from 2005-2016. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project after May 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Unknowable Room collection profile](http://www.archiveofourown.org/collections/unknowableroom).

a/n: Wow, it was a temporary break from writer’s block! Review! Title from Counting Crows.

  
**folded and unfolded and unfolding**

(or, several instances in which Victoire Weasley feels lighter and heavier at the same time)

 

\--  


Victoire sort of hates that Weasley-red hair tone, except for her dad’s, but only because it’s Dad.

 

It’s too sharp. She prefers the color of the pale blonde fuzz she was born with, rather than the strawberry-blonde that has somehow developed over the years. It’s a bit preferable to the fiery locks of her uncles and aunt and cousins, and the blonde makes it a little pink. It _should_ be orange, that mix of red and blonde. 

 

(It’s definitely closer to pink, though.)

\--

Language has never been her strong suit. Her French sounds hideous, _‘ideous_ , and she stopped calling Mum _Maman_ when she was three. It’s because she grew up in England, and most everyone she associated with is natively English. Also, she never really cared to stick to it (which she regrets, sometimes). She understands, though. Mostly. Kind of.

 

Sometimes, Mum mixes languages unconsciously when she talks (Frenglish, Victoire calls it; _frooong-glaaay_ , says Uncle George). Half the time, Victoire doesn’t quite comprehend her properly, but her mother doesn’t have a clue. 

 

Mum is understanding when Victoire decides to go to Hogwarts instead of Beauxbatons. 

 

(“Well, you’re a Weasley,”� says Uncle Ron. “It’s not in our nature to be worldly. ‘Cept Charlie, maybe. Hogwarts beats Beauxbatons anyway. Don’t tell your mother I said that, yeah?”�)

\--

Victoire collects sweaters and comfortable cloaks and warm knitted blankets with a multiplicity of initials and names sewn into the hem. It’s not a voluntary thing, exactly. The castle is often chilly and the boys simply don’t mind if she keeps them all.

 

“What’s that about?”� she asks Teddy one day. “Not that I’m complaining. I’ve gotten lots of stuff.”�

 

Teddy shrugs, sinks into the chair as he leans back and tilts his head at what Victoire assumes must be a particularly difficult Arithmancy question. It’s November, a Saturday, and it’s cold, and Victoire is wearing a sweater of some fourth-year named Gregory Davis. Teddy squints at the parchment, holds his breath for a second, then smiles, nodding. He writes something down, shuts his textbook, and places it on the table next to his Prefect’s badge, rather lackluster for having been brand new two months ago. 

 

Gregory’s sweater starts feeling itchy. Teddy stretches his arms over his head. A piece of purplish-brown hair falls in his matching eyelashes as he yawns.

 

“So. Whose jumper is that, hm?”� Teddy smirks. Victoire shrugs. He laughs. “You’re just running the show now, aren’t you?”� 

 

“What’s that _about_?”� she reiterates and rolls her eyes.

 

“Seriously?”� He raises an eyebrow. She shrugs again. He smiles. “Oh, _Victoire_. So young. So naÃ¯ve yet.”�

 

She starts to question him about that, but Lauren Wood hops down the stairs and ruffles Teddy’s hair from behind.

 

“Ready for rounds?”� she asks as he looks up.

 

“Sure.”� He winks at Victoire when he leaves.

 

Victoire doesn’t notice that their hands are clasped when they climb out the portrait hole.

 

(Except, she does. She really, _really_ does.)

\--

The way his mouth moves against hers is absolutely sublime. She doesn’t know whether it’s because he is naturally a good kisser or something stupid, like he’s her soul mate or something, or he has _gotten_ this good over time. She freaks out a little, too conscious of everything that’s happening, and puts her hand on his chest. He takes it as encouragement and he presses against her. It suddenly feels nice again, and she kisses him back. Somewhere far away, she hears a clock chime. She wonders if it’s midnight. New Year.

 

Frank Lewis definitely isn’t Teddy Lupin, but he’ll do for now.

 

(Her New Year’s resolution is two words, proper nouns, ten letters, with color-changing eyes, perfect teeth, and a penchant for Defense Against the Dark Arts. She thinks about this when Frank’s fingers fumble with the buttons on her shirt.)

\--

Victoire finds newspaper clippings of her mother and Uncle Harry in 1994’s Triwizard Tournament, standing in a line next to Viktor Krum and Cedric Diggory. Harry looks embarrassed, the quintessential underdog, hair wild as it is now, except thicker and not as gray. Skinny with crooked glasses and that infamous scar peeking out above semi-furrowed eyebrows and a forced smile that doesn’t quite reach his green-green- _green_ eyes. Shoulders slumped and hands in his pockets, Harry is small and insignificant next to his elder opponents. She isn’t sure if Harry still has any of these clippings, but she knows that Aunt Hermione must have a collection of them somewhere. (“Just for safe-keeping,”� she would say).

 

Viktor Krum is big and brawn, rugged and tough with clenched fists and an unsmiling mouth. Victoire has met him maybe a dozen times, and every time they meet he comments about the likeness of their first names and his stare makes her uncomfortable. He is married and his wife is stupid, Victoire thinks, utterly stupid — but Victoire thinks there is something inexplicably attractive about the young Viktor Krum, and she is pretty sure there’s something wrong with her for thinking so.

 

Mum’s beautiful, tall and slim and confident. Victoire doubts she has changed much since she was seventeen; Fleur Delacour is still Fleur Delacour, just a little softer around the edges, physically and otherwise. Victoire sort of thinks that her mother was probably the type of girl she hates at Hogwarts, nose in the air and a bit arrogant. Victoire knows that the Veela gene in her has helped her more than harmed her, but she tries not to think about it too often — that would make her like Mum, wouldn’t it? (It’s _Mum_ , though, so of course she loves her more than anything… but still.)

 

She doesn’t have a present image to compare to the teenage Cedric Diggory. He’s gorgeous, she thinks, a young man growing into his element. She’s heard the story a few times, once from Harry himself. Some people have called him a martyr, but he isn’t, not really. He didn’t sign up for his death, and his story is different from that of Uncle Fred or Teddy’s parents. She can’t decide which is sadder. 

 

(In the article, Cedric said his favorite subject was Defense, and that out of his seven teachers, Professor Lupin was probably his favorite.)

\--

The Burrow is crowded with Weasleys and the like, fresh snow outside glistens with the magicked lights hung outside, and the crisp smell of the Christmas tree wafts in from every direction. With a lack of kids her own age and an excess of adults who mostly ignore her, Victoire settles herself with a tall glass of some sort of mixed alcoholic drink that Uncle George has forgotten about. When the doorbell rings and in come the Potters, she grins hazily at the figure trailing behind a little, midnight-blue hair sprinkled with white specks of snow.

 

“ _Hi!_ ”� she squeals when he hugs her.

 

“Had a bit to drink?”� he asks, grinning, but she doesn’t answer him because there is no more, _no more_ time to waste and if there’s any such thing as the right moment, it’s now, _now_ , so she grabs onto him again and wraps her arms tightly around his torso, buries her face in his neck. She is warm from the fire (or the alcohol) and he is cold from the winter air. She breathes in deeply, tastes the liquor on her tongue, and places a light kiss on his neck. “Okay,”� he says slowly. “I guess so.”�

 

“You look really good today,”� she mumbles, tightening her hold.

 

“Thanks.”� His hands latch onto her wrists and he untangles himself from her grip. He smirks. “Where’s the booze?”�

 

(Now, she tells herself, _right now_ , she keeps thinking, but instead she leads him to the kitchen and later they make drunken snow angels and sing off-key to Christmas songs they’ve forgotten the words to.)

\--

She should’ve told him when she was drunk, when he was drunk, but she didn’t. Now, he looks at his hands and at her and his hands and at her. She starts to laugh and he raises his eyebrow at her. He asks if she’s joking — that it’s a fucked up joke if she is — but she assures him she’s serious and her words come out as a breathy giggle. He rolls his eyes and she thinks he is devastatingly handsome as he walks out of the common room, away from her.

 

(She feels young, then, and stupid, and who cares if she’s part-Veela if Teddy Lupin’s going to walk away from her? She keeps laughing, though, because it makes the wait a little easier.)

\--

She’s walking back from the Owlery, frozen-cold hands rubbing together, a pathetic attempt to warm herself up, when he catches up to her and grabs her elbow.

 

“Hey,”� he says. She smiles softly, and that seems to be all the reaction he needs before launching into a big, gesturing story about the prank he pulled on one of his friends today. She hears him but she doesn’t listen, not really, and she decides it’s rude to deceive him and stops him mid-sentence.

 

“I don’t care,”� she sighs. He closes his mouth.

 

“All right,”� he says. He gives her a look that crushes her bones and melts her veins in so many ways as he starts to turn away.

 

“Wait!”� He turns back around, and she shrugs. “I mean — I do, but I can’t concentrate on anything you’re saying. I’m sorry.”�

 

He nods and shoves his hands in his pockets. He rolls back and forth on his heels and Victoire feels her heart thump in time with every forward and backward motion of his body. 

 

“You’re serious, then?”� he says finally, and she shrugs again. 

 

“Of course,”� she answers.

 

“Of course,”� he repeats. He considers something for a moment, before sighing. “Well — you know, _of course_ , that I’ve been desperately in love with you for years — which is wrong, entirely wrong, by the way, because you’re… _Victoire_ … and all.”�

 

He stops rocking back and forth and her heart might as well stop beating, too. 

 

They’re both quiet for a moment, a month, a year — and then she smiles and says, “So Professor Longbottom saw you, then?”�

 

His face glows a little and he smiles back. “Yeah. Roger spun this fantastic story out of thin air and Longbottom definitely knew — but Roger’s a dolt so he kept talking…”�

 

(And they keep walking, except her hands find another way to keep warm, right here and right now, _now_.)


End file.
